Too Late
by SeaEmerald
Summary: He was her best friend. He was her confidant. He was her go-to guy on a bad day. And he loved that relationship with her. Treasured it, actually. He really thought she would be with him forever. It wasn't until it was too late that he realized forever was just another word in the dictionary...


**DISCLAIMER: I DON'T OWN WINX CLUB.**

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He saw her for the first time when he was sixteen. God, that feels so long ago. She was just a few months younger than him when they met, but there was a spark in her that had made her seem years younger.

"_Damn it!" he cursed loudly. Mewling in frustration at yet another failed attempt to compose a satisfying tune, he crumpled up the music sheet before throwing it aside in a sheer burst of anger, paying no attention to the park's pleas for no littering. He sighed, closing his eyes for a few moments. _

"_Don't stop," he heard a voice. _

_Surprised by the unfamiliar voice that seemed to be speaking to him, he opened his eyes to meet with a pair of bright, ocean-blue eyes. He saw a curious redhead in front of him with a cute grey bunny curling around her neck. _

"_What?" he replied, stunned by a stranger's meddling into his lone time._

"_Your music," the redhead smiled, pointing to the thrown away sheets. "Don't stop writing."_

"…" _He honestly didn't know what to say. Who the hell was this girl? Actually…he didn't care. He followed her gaze to the wrinkled white papers before turning back to her. "Uh…thanks…" he said somewhat awkwardly. He may not know her, but he was grateful for the comfort she seemed to be offering. "I guess I just wanted to be good at what I want to do when I grow up," he admitted. He didn't understand why he was confiding something so personal to a stranger but a part of him felt as if he knew her. _

"_Even a genius starts out small," she replied with an encouraging smile. "Think about what inspires you and start from there."_

_He couldn't help but smile back at her though it was faint. "Thanks, uh…" he trailed off._

"_Bloom. My name is Bloom," she smiled at him. _

He smiled to himself at that memory. It was still as vivid and fresh as if he met her only minutes ago, not years. On the day he met her, he hadn't thought much of her. He had brushed it off as an encouragement in disguise. As a blessing of sort to pursue his passion for music. His perspective changed, however, when he saw her again.

_Entering the coffee shop, he took a whiff of the delicious aroma that swirled in the air. His appetite for a scrumptious breakfast grew as he approached the counter to order. His eyes hovered on the menu items displayed above._

"_Good morning! What would you like to—" the girl at the counter began before stopping all of a sudden. "Oh, hi!"_

_He blinked for a moment before his gaze shifted towards a familiar redhead. His eyes looked lost for a moment before they flashed in recognition. "…Bloom?"_

"_Hi! How are you?" she smiled._

_He let out a small chuckle. "Great, what about you?" he smiled back at her._

"_Peachy," she winked. "So, what would you like to order?" she smiled._

That day…she lingered in his thoughts for longer than two seconds. But he gradually forgot about her by the next morning. He didn't think much of her though she did pop into his head from time to time whenever he picked up his guitar or found inspiration for a new song to write.

Gardenia was a fairly small town. It really wasn't a miracle or considered "fate" to meet a stranger again in another place and time.

_But_ even coincidences have their limits. He had to learn that the hard way when he saw her again six months later…

"_Excuse me, may I come in?" a familiar voice interrupted the class._

"_And who might you be, young lady?" the teacher asked, a little miffed at seeing students casually come so late to class. Where has the discipline gone these days?_

"_My name is Bloom Peters. I'm a transfer student."_

_At that, his eyes instantly snapped up in pleasant surprise as he turned towards the door. It really is her._

"_Very well, come in, but make no mistake to be on time from tomorrow," the teacher said, softening._

_The redhead nodded before entering the class. She looked around for an empty seat when her eyes fell on him. Her eyes widened before her lips stretched into a smile as she raised her hand to wave to him. But she put her hand down, presumably wondering if he even remembered her. He couldn't help but chuckle. He flashed her a smile, confirming that, indeed, he does remember her. Instantly, the evergreen smile on her face returned as she sat in the empty seat beside him._

_The teacher continued with his class._

"_Hey," he whispered to her with a smile._

"_Hi," she giggled. "I didn't know you went here."_

"_Well, now you do," he smiled. "So…know anyone else here?"_

_Her smile shifted into a dull frown. "Nope," she shrugged._

"…_Well, I can show you around, if you'd like," he found himself offering._

_She paused for a second. "That'll be great, thanks," she smiled, nodding slowly and accepting his offer._

It hadn't taken them long to exchange numbers. They became friends. They spent time together. They had sleepovers. They finished assignments together. They did everything together. Over time, their friendship thickened. Until the friendship turned into something else entirely for one of them. It was a cliched relationship where one of the best friends falls in love with the other. But can he help it? She was just too captivating to resist. She had her flaws, sure, but the problem was that he liked them as well.

He didn't think there would be a threat to his relationship with her until she dropped the bomb on him one day.

"_He's so hot…" she dreamily sighed, blushing to herself._

_He blinked and looked up from his phone in surprise. WHAT? "Excuse me?" he blurted out loud, wondering if he had heard that right._

"_Duh, the captain of the football team! He's hot," she gushed. "Don't you think so?"_

_He stared at her, wide-eyed. …A crush? Is that what she was trying to tell him? That she has a crush? _

_He didn't need to wonder for long. The blush on her cheeks which went redder than the color of her hair was more than answer enough. _

_Feeling her pensive, awaiting stare on him, he swallowed the bile that threatened its way up his throat before responding. "…Erm, well, I don't really look at guys that way, Bloom," he grumbled under his breath._

_She scoffed and rolled her eyes before going to stalk her newfound crush on social media._

The frown on his face was impossible to miss. She had been so happy that day. She resembled a crazy fangirl gushing endlessly over her object of obsession. He felt her growing distant over the next few weeks. And he didn't mean the time they spent together. She was with him but all she could talk about was her crush. It didn't take him long to develop a deep hatred for the so-called captain of the football team.

The day she innocently cancelled one of their sleepovers was the day he'd never forget in his life. It's when everything that was right in his life went wrong. It was the day his life had started to go south and spiral out of control. It absolutely crushed him though he didn't shed a single tear. She left him because she scored the date she finally wanted. She chose that guy over him. She threw their friendship away and expected him to be understanding about it.

She continued to cancel their traditional game nights.

"_Just this once! Pleaseeeee!" she begged him over the phone to not feel upset about it._

The happiness that radiated from her hadn't allowed him to pester her any longer.

"_Okay. Enjoy yourself," he replied wistfully._

"_Thank you! You're the best!" she screamed before hanging up the phone._

No…he wasn't the best.

"_Then why are you with him?" he whispered, holding the phone to his ear though she hung up and left a long time ago._

He knew he should be expecting that her relationship would evolve into something bigger.

_"He asked me to be his girlfriend!" she grinned happily while jumping up and down in his arms. _

_He was happy for her. For himself? Not so much._

Though he expected it, it didn't hurt any less to hear the official confirmation. If anything, it tore him from the inside.

Soon, their meetings got less and less as she poured all of that time into that _captainnnn. _

He didn't know what went wrong in her "perfect" relationship as she had put it. He despised her. He hated her so much for throwing his feelings away like they didn't matter. But when she had shown up on his doorstep one day looking like a lost puppy, begging to be comforted…he couldn't turn his face away.

"_I thought he loved me!" the redhead sobbed._

_He didn't respond. He didn't even know what happened in order to start making assumptions. She couldn't even tell how deeply he felt for her. She couldn't even see the love he had for her though they were clear as day for everyone except for her. She mistook his love for friendship. So, it didn't really surprise him that she mistook her relationship for love._

_But…he comforted her anyway._

She left his doorstep again, telling him that she and her so-called boyfriend just had a misunderstanding, and everything was back to normal again. He didn't know what became of his feelings. Was that happiness that she was happy? Or heartbreak that she was indeed happy with someone other than him?

They soon graduated high school and went off to college.

When she remembered every one of his birthdays and wished him at the stroke of midnight, he didn't know what to think. Was she mocking him? Was she wishing him a birthday despite knowing it will never be a happy one?

If love can't survive in long-distance relationships, he didn't think that a dying friendship would. But somehow…it did. Or at least, he thought it did. He was in town during the last summer of his college years and coincidentally, so was she. They did the obvious. They met up. Her boyfriend wasn't in town and that was probably the only reason she thought of her longtime friend.

But after hearing what she had to say, he wished he had stayed back in his dorm.

Because she hadn't come alone.

"_He proposed to meeee!" she laughed joyfully._

_His body went slack before his jet-black eyes dimmed even more. His eyes wandered down to her hand, but he couldn't find a ring on either finger._

"_Oh, I don't have the ring yet," she blushed sheepishly. "He asked me if I would marry him one day and I said yes!" she gushed, twirling in her dreamy land. _

She hadn't come alone. She came with a weapon to stab him straight in the heart.

A year or two passed. They graduated from college too. Time was flying by, but he was still stuck in the same place he always was. It wasn't long before she got that ring. It crippled his very existence. He should've expected this to happen. He should've prepared his heart to absorb that pain. But he didn't.

She was over the moon when she got that ring. It was official. She was engaged to someone else.

Another year or two passed. They saw each other again.

_He swallowed in fear as she looked at him with happy tears in her eyes. Every time she was happy, it only meant more anguish for him.__He took a deep breath to push the lump down his throat. "Yes?"__ he replied weakly, ignoring the way his chest congested. _

_"Will you walk me down the aisle?" she asked. "I want both my father and best friend there," she softly said._

_His eyes softened. How can he ever say no to this face?_

_Masking his heartbreak with a forced smile, he nodded._

And finally…that day has arrived.

He swallowed the tears that touched his eyes as he walked her down the aisle. He wanted to watch her walk down the aisle, not be the one to walk her down on it.

His heart felt as if it's been ripped out and crushed mercilessly as they reached the altar. He cursed his fate as he gave her hand to the man who'll become her husband in a few minutes. "…Take care of her, Sky," he said as his heart continued to bleed.

"I plan to," Sky smiled as he gazed down at his fiancée.

The redhead turned back towards him before wrapping her slender arms around him. "I love you, Andy," she softly said, resting her head on his chest.

He closed his eyes for a moment as he finally heard the three words he had waited for over a decade. But under different circumstances. It was cruel. "I love you more, Bloom. Always," he chokingly whispered before placing a gentle, feathery kiss on her forehead. He never thought he would tell her these words in this situation.

He let her go before he could break down in front of everyone. He stood to the side, joining the rest of the groomsmen. He didn't hear the pastor recite what marriage entails. He kept his eyes on the redhead, burning her face into his mind as if it's the last time he'll ever see it again.

"If anyone has any objections regarding this holy affair, please speak now."

He had to do _everything _in his power not to scream objection in front of everyone. But he didn't. Despite being less than five feet away from her, his lips were sewn shut.

"Congratulations. You are now husband and wife. You may now kiss the bride," the pastor addressed.

At the very same time, Andy felt his world crash down into oblivion. The colors faded from his life as he was greeted with the cold embrace of black and white. His eyes lost any remaining remnants of life, not that there was much left in the first place. Everyone cheered and threw fiery red rose petals around in ecstasy for the newly married couple, _including _him.

"Goodbye, Bloom," he whispered as a lone tear slipped down his cheek. He never imagined that he'd have to say goodbye to her even when she's right in front of him. It was now official. She belonged to another man. And one day, she'll have children with him. She'll have a _family_ with him. She'll spend the rest of her _life _with _him._A part of him always knew that but this ceremony just made it official and told him firmly that he'll never have a chance with her.

There was point in regretting now. If he looked back and wondered what would've happened if he had just manned up and told her of his feelings, it would destroy the last remaining remnants of his life. It would crush him to know that he let go of a chance with her.

With a broken heart, he whispered a final goodbye to her as his cursed existence watched the newly wedded couple seal their vows with a kiss.

_Goodbye._

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**AN: **I don't particularly like the Andy in the show, but I liked him here in my own fiction. In fact, I find him a little annoying in the show. Despite that, I also didn't like how Andy was just tossed aside and was only pulled in again when the Winx needed musical instruments. And then he was thrown aside altogether like a burnt potato once the Winx became musical sensations overnight. Poor guy *-* As if that wasn't enough, I gift him an unforgettable dose of heartbreak. *sniffles*


End file.
